A Single Step
by thecivilunrest
Summary: "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." - Confucius / / Roy&Lian, it only takes Roy three days to fall in love. For Annica.
1. Day One

**Disclaimer: **All copyrighted material does not belong to me.

**A/N: **Honestly I don't really know the whole story of how Roy got Lian in the comics-though I do believe it had to do with Jade getting sent to prison for terrorism-but it doesn't really matter here. This is the YJ-verse. And if Lian doesn't make an appearance, well then I can always say it's AU. So don't say I'm 'getting it wrong' or what have you, please. And this will have limited dialogue- as in it'll only have dialogue in flashbacks or when Roy is talking to Lian. Also, though I'm loathe to do this, flashbacks are in past tense. I hope this isn't boring! Please tell me what you think.

**Dedication: **For Annica (**Clair-Rae**) for your birthday. I know you _really _wanted Roy/Jade... but this has Roy/Jade in it! And I don't know, this just came to me in a dream and I just really, _really _wanted to write it. If you don't like it then I'll write you something else I swear. :D

_A Single Step_

_**Day One**_

Roy's not sure where he is, other than the fact that it's humid as hell and the floor is dirt, as his taste buds are informing him. His hands are tied behind his back, sore from being in that position for a long time. There's a lump that's growing out of the back of his head and it's throbbing.

But he's alive. Always the silver lining in situation. He might be face first into the dirt in the middle of God Only Knows-ville, but his heart is beating and there's air in his lungs and he can get out of this.

The knots on the ropes are tricky, and he rubs his wrists raw getting out of them, but once his hands are free he can get up and get his face out of the dirt. His clothes are still in tact, and he's otherwise unharmed, which he finds odd.

Roy surveys the room- which is made out of wood with a thatched roof, the floor dirt which he already knew. His bow isn't anywhere in sight. The only other thing in the room is a basket made out of reeds. He approaches it carefully, not knowing what was inside of it.

Grenades, bombs, a gas that could kill him if he got near enough. The list goes on and on, and he counts them all as he makes its way towards the basket.

What is _actually _inside somehow manages to be even worse than the things that he had imagined.

It's a baby, one so young that its features aren't distinguishable, but instead generic. Cute, even, if he wants to imagine that. A tuft of soft, dark hair sits upon its head. He'd think it was gorgeous, if he wasn't so worried about why the baby was with him.

It- he or she, Roy can't tell and he's _definitely _not going to _look_- makes a soft noise in the back of its throat before turning its cheek so that its touching the white sheet that it is currently sleeping on. When it turns its head he can see a piece of paper sticking out behind its head.

So Roy does the only reasonable thing that he can see at this point. He reads picks it up and reads it.

_She's yours_, the paper informs him in scrawl that could be familiar if he let it._ Her name is Lian. There's enough food for her for three days, and it's a eastward three day walk to the nearest village. Make your choice then. _

It is, naturally, not signed.

The first thing that Roy thinks is H_ow could this have happened? _Which is ludicrous because _of course _he knows how it happened. He was there first hand _making _it happen. The second is _This is so fucked up._

Jade-and he knows that it was Jade because he hasn't seen her in about ten months and the baby-Lian-looks to be about a month old in his rough estimation. She was the only woman that this could have happened with, the only woman that he _would _have let this happen with.

And she didn't even have the decency to tell him face to face. Instead she sics men on him, ties him up, and leaves him to fend for himself with a baby in a basket. He should have known that this job had been fishy from the start, but he'd heard _Vietnam _and _League of Shadows_ and thought _Jade _and volunteered himself.

He is stupid. So goddamn _stupid_.

He's also, evidently, a father.

Roy Harper is a father. He doesn't like the way that sounds, not even in his own head. Eighteen years old and a father. He gets a feeling that MTV isn't going to want to give him a spot on their Sixteen and Pregnant show.

He is so, _so _fucked.

.x.

The first time Roy and Jade had sex he still didn't even know her real name. Her mask had been off, however, which he figured was a step in the right direction. After all she didn't know his name either.

She'd been tied up at first. He'd finally gotten her exactly where he wanted her, and she was going to answer his questions.

"You know," Jade had told him, "there are easier ways to get a girl to go on a date with you. You don't _have _to tie them up. With your looks you'd think they'd be all over you."

"This is not a date."

There was no room for argument in his tone, but she'd found something to say anyway. Her words were slippery, making their way into his brain and stopping him short before she'd managed to to do what she want.

"I'll bet you say that to _all _the girls. Honestly I don't think Stockholm is a good look on me. You'll have to try better than tying me to a chair."

"You can't escape." Roy had made sure of it.

"Want to bet money on that? Because I think I _can_." And with that she was up and off the chair. Before he could react she had him backed up against the wall, knife at his throat.

Cheshire was good, there was no doubt about it. She smiled at him when she knew that she had him, because she did, and for the length of a heartbeat he could see why the sailors had followed the sirens to their watery deaths, smiling as they died. He could see why people had been attracted to the faerie, who laughed with glee, eyes full of mirth, as they watched a human die a horrible death and turn into something grotesque.

But then he saw what he was supposed to see, which was the grin of the Cheshire cat that she was named for, the one knew that its only way out was through it.

Roy couldn't stop his heart from pounding, but it wasn't because he was frightened. Only the opposite, in a way. Cheshire knew this.

She leaned in, her hair grazing the side of his face as she put her lips to his ear. "I like it rough. And I _know_ that you do too."

Things had only gone downhill from there.

.x.

They hadn't used protection, which Roy guesses he should have known would come back to bite them in the ass, but in all honesty he'd thought _she'd _taken care of it.

Roy is obviously a fucktard.

And a father. Can't forget that little detail. The basket in front of him won't let him.

A urge to leave takes over him then, running through his veins like adrenaline. He didn't have to deal with this. He could just leave the baby here and pretend that it- she- had never happened. He could walk away.

But he can't... For one thing she is a baby, an innocent. Lian had committed no sin other than to be born. For another he shouldn't even be able to think like that. Roy is a vigilante, a part of the tights-and-capes circle. He had sworn to protect innocents, to protect the people that couldn't protect themselves.

And that is extended to children, even to children that aren't needed or wanted.

As if Lian knows what he was thinking she opens her eyes, which startled him so much that his thoughts were broken. They are still the blue of a newborn, though he has a feeling they were going to turn dark like her mother's.

She opened her mouth then and began to scream, her face turning red. Roy understands her reaction. After all, he feels the same way.

The panic sets in then, his whole body screaming at him that he is _so fucked_.

He picks her up, thinking of what he's seen in movies, which only serves to make her angrier. Her screams grow sharper and she's right next to his ear, which doesn't help the headache that he has from the lump on his head. Wanting to stop the crying Roy desperately dumps the basket over. The note said that there was food for her. And babies only cried when they were hungry.

Right?

It terrifies Roy that he doesn't have an answer.

Three large bottles, the kind that you see in grocery stores, fall out of a white bag, which is filled with ten white squares of cloth that Roy can't even begin to imagine what they are. Gratefully he takes one and attempts to put Lian in a his right arm instead of on his chest.

She's still screaming, but at least she isn't so close to his ear. He tries to place the bottle gently in her mouth, but he doesn't know how well that turns out. After she realizes what is in her mouth Lian instinctively starts to suck, and in the process stops screaming.

It's scary, the relief that floods him, washing over his own body. When Lian is quiet things are quiet. Peaceful even.

Roy notices then, with her in one arm, him supporting her head the way that he'd been trained to do with the babies of Ollie's relatives and the babies back at the reservation, that she's only as big as his arm.

He knows what he has to do, then.

It's going to be a long three days.

.x.

As soon as Lian is done feeding, she only drinks one fourth of the bottle which kind of relieves him because there isn't much to do, he starts walking towards the east, Lian in a bundle on his chest and the bag that Jade had so _lovingly _provided for him. Lian thankfully goes to sleep after she burps, which Roy hadn't even known babies could do but his could at the very least.

With a piece of bread in his hand, Jade had only provided one loaf for three days, but he could handle it, and his daughter on his chest he starts on his journey. He's not sure what kind of journey, but they'll make it.

They have to.

**A/N: **This is a three-shot, so I _will _finish it. Three-shots are the only kind of multi-chaptered story that I seem to be able to handle. And please review!


	2. Day Two

**Disclaimer: **All copyrighted characters do not belong to me.

**A/N: **I'm a bit iffy about this chapter. I feel like it's kind of choppy. But wait until the next chapter, that one is going to be better than this one. :) I'm trying to make this as realistic as possible, which means lots of research (and I have some experience in real life with babies) about pretty much everything that I'm writing about. Please review! I really want you guys to tell me what you think (even if you think this sucks) because this is a new sort of story for me!

_A Single Step_

_**Day Two**_

Roy wakes up to a crying baby and baby pee all over the front of his shirt. _Lovely_.

He anticipated the crying, though. Lian had woken him up once before that night, wanting to be fed and changed, which he had done easily. Roy had never been a heavy sleeper and having to sleep on the ground in a Vietnamese jungle didn't exactly make him relax. But he'd been so exhausted that he'd eventually had to succumb.

The little squares of cloth that Roy had seen yesterday in the bag with the bottles were cloth diapers, which Roy had found out the first time that Lian had gotten a little rank and he'd gone to check her lower half. The diaper was folded onto Lian's tiny body in a way that Roy could never hope to replicate, but remembering something from somewhere long ago Roy made sure that she was as dry as possible with another diaper so that she didn't get diaper rash. He'd then had to fold a new one on her, but after several failures Roy had given up and decided to just tie up the corners and hoped they'd stay on, which they mostly had.

Until now.

"I'm hurrying," Roy tells the baby, who is still crying despite his promise. First things first, though. That diaper has got to go. With Lian sleeping on his chest he knows every time that she pees because it soaks through, unless she fusses right before or right after she's supposed to eat. Even though he's only had roughly twenty-four hours with the kid he knows that whenever she fusses or cries either she's hungry or she has a dirty diaper.

(A small part of him thinks that maybe babies aren't so bad once you know their tells.)

After he's finished tying the diaper again, and praying that it'll stay on and that she won't poop any time soon, he gets out another bottle and puts Lian's head in the crook of his arm before putting the bottle in her mouth. Part of his mind wonders randomly if the milk's still good, but he figures that it is. Jade wouldn't give her- their- daughter anything that might make her sick. He thinks.

He's just going to ignore the fact that she left Lian in a basket on the off chance that Roy might just take her with him.

Once Roy's avoided yet another baby related crisis and he eats another chunk of bread, he notices that the sun is coming up. The sky is painted in rich hues of pink and orange and a faint blue, which is receding more and more by the minute.

And for a little while it's Roy and Lian, just watching the sunrise.

.x.

He starts walking as soon as Lian and he are done with their breakfast. He burps Lian, remembering the move from another movie, but he thinks that he might have thumped her a little too hard and that leads to some spit up and yet another stain on his shirt, but at this point he just accepts it. He'll never be able to wear this shirt again and as soon as he gets back to the States he'll have to throw this thing in the nearest dumpster.

Lian goes to sleep soon afterwords, the rocking motion of Roy's walking lulling her to sleep. For a while there's nothing to really see, just a dry road with Vietnamese jungle on either side. A few airplanes pass overhead, but he figures they must just be on their way to a large city. Occasionally he passes people, and they just stare at him.

Red headed men carrying tiny babies must not come around that often.

.x.

The thought strikes him the way that lightning might hit metal, the way inspiration hits artists. It kind of hurts, in a way.

_What if Lian isn't actually his? _

He wouldn't put it past Jade to lie- it's not like the woman's a saint and it's not like she's never done it before. In fact it almost makes sense. It might just be another one of her games. Jade chose her alias well. The Cheshire, it likes to play games, to send people up and down, backwards and forwards.

Roy knows that he's always been her play thing, something to keep her occupied because she was bored.

The two of them were always a game to her. He knew that, accepted it long before the first time they'd played any sort of indoor sport.

But about something this _important_? Her child's life?

He just can't see that.

Plus the pieces just don't fit together as neatly as he'd like them to. Jade didn't want to kill him, he can't see there being any kind motive. _Why _would she lie about that? _Why _would she want him to find a child, this particular child?

The hows and the whys just don't match up, and if there was anything that Roy knew about Jade it was that her _whys _always made sense. Jade has always had a transparent cause and effect for everything that she does, and he'd always been able to put the two together when it came to her.

But not with this. She hadn't even hurt him, not really. If she'd wanted to kill him she would have already, it was as simple as that.

She wouldn't have let him walk for two straight days oh her home turf, she wouldn't have given him diapers and food for the baby or for himself, she wouldn't have given him directions into the nearest village.

And besides, that contradicts what _he's _feeling too. Because as soon as the thought had crossed his mind another conviction, one that is much stronger than doubt, He _knows _that Lian is his daughter. He knows it. He isn't exactly ecstatic about it- How can he be? He's only nineteen and has a kid, and an unplanned one at that?- but he does.

He knows it the way that a nun knows God, the way that he knows that he's a good archer. It's just there, in his bones. Somehow that feeling has made its way inside his marrow, and it's not planing to leave.

Lian makes a noise at the back of her throat, and then nestles her cheek against his chest. Her head is right where his shoulder meets his neck, where it's been since he started on this expedition. When Roy looks down at her, some sort of feeling comes over him, but he can't place it. Not really. Instead of trying to figure it out, he kisses the top of her soft head, her soft hair tickling his face.

The move is instinctual and he does it without thinking.

.x.

He finally stops after it's been dark a couple of hours. He has to admit that he's exhausted- almost nonstop walking for two days can do that to a person. And Lian is getting fussy, and they're both sweaty and disgusting, though Roy has to admit that he's taken the 'Most Gross' title out of the both of them.

He tries to find a nice, cool place at the edge of the forest. He doesn't want to go too far into the jungle without his bow and he doesn't want to deal with critters, though he does see a few bugs that look like they could eat the baby easily.

When he sits down he puts Lian on her back- he figures that she has less of a chance of suffocating that way. She'd just eaten two hours ago and so she won't be hungry for another two, so he's safe there.

This is her active time of night, as he found out last night. Babies, or at least babies as small as Lian, aren't very interesting. They poop, pee, eat and sleep. But sometimes she opens her eyes and keeps them that way for a while.

These are the most interesting moments for Roy. Lian's eyes have been getting slowly darker and they remind him of Jade's if he's looking hard enough. But they also have a look of wonder in them, and it's at times like these he realizes that she's never seen the world before. This planet, it's all new to her.

"Those are leaves," he tells her. He feels kind of stupid informing Lian of what she's looking at, but he does it anyway. Lian blinks, and he pretends that means that she understands, like she's a patient coming out of a coma or something. "They make things more cool, at least for a little while."

"This is kind of weird, you know," he informs her, sitting down next to her and putting his hand on her tummy. Talking to Lian makes him feel just a little bit better. It's been over twenty-four hours since he last spoke to someone that could understand him, but speaking to Lian takes the edge off of that. "I mean, who would have thought that I'd be nineteen and have a kid? I sure as hell didn't. I mean, I'm so fucked. When I get back... I can't even say what's going to happen. A shit storm, probably." Roy lets out a breath that he'd been holding.

"And if _I'm _fucked then _you're _fucked. We're kind of in this together, you know?" Lian blinks and makes a noise, her mouth round. "Yeah, I bet that you do..." he plans to go on, but he stops when there's a gripping feeling around his finger.

It's Lian's hand, wrapped around his finger. She squeezes it, so lightly that he can barely feel it.

That feeling, the one from before, comes back. It comes over him and makes a lump form in the back of his throat.

He doesn't know where the hell it comes from. It's washes over him from head to toe, and it's scary. Roy's never felt anything like this before.

But then she lets go and it's like it never happened at all, the pressure from her fingers is gone that fast. Lian makes another noise, blinks at him. Slowly he takes his hand off of her stomach and uses it to cover his eyes.

He's screwed.

.x.

He makes the decision that night, when Lian's head is in the position that it's always in, right after he feeds and changes her and can finally go to sleep.

Roy knows that he can't take care of her properly. Not like she deserves. He's nineteen and a vigilante and shit like this wasn't supposed to happen to him. He is the adopted son of Oliver Queen, the sidekick-turned-partner-turned-colleague of Green Arrow.

Babies don't fit into that equation. Adding Lian in there would just screw everything up. He'd be giving her a better life, really. He doesn't know how exactly you give up a baby for adoption- he never had to worry about that sort of thing before because he was _smart _before Jade happened- but he's going to have to do it.

He thinks it might just be better for both of them.


	3. Day Three

**Disclaimer: **All copyrighted material does not belong to me.

**A/N: **Well this part of the story is researched, which is probably why it took so long. There actually isn't a lot of info out there about Vietnamese orphanages (that I could find) that isn't as depressing as all get out and just factual. So I took a bit of a creative licence. Honestly I didn't want this to end- I still don't. This was really fun to write and I just loved the idea, which is so weird because I generally hate baby!fic (unless it's done _really _well) but here I just wrote some. Anyway, please enjoy the last installment. (:

_A Single Step_

_**Day Three**_

That morning he's absolutely decided on what he's going to do. He has to give Lian up, he _has _to. It's for the best. And as Lian Harper's father he has to do the best for her, so he will.

For what he knows to be the last time Roy feeds Lian breakfast, and they watch the sunrise. For the last time he changes her diaper. For the last time she falls asleep on his chest after he walks a while.

It's just a morning of lasts and he honestly doesn't know what to think about it.

"I'm going to miss you," he tells her, unable to help himself.

Lian sleeps on, not aware.

.x.

He hears the airport before he sees it, the hum of the airplanes making their way to the ground. The airplanes that he saw yesterday must have been coming here.

The airport is small, the only planes being the kind that can only fit a few people. He can easily picture why people come to this airport, it's only a branch of a larger airport. But why would people want to come _here _is what Roy can't understand.

He's walked for three days in this general direction, and there isn't anything particularly beautiful. Sure the foliage is pretty, but it isn't anything spectacular and Roy imagines that you can see this sort of thing anywhere in Vietnam.

It's when he sees the signs inside the airport, written in both English and Vietnamese, that he understands. For a minute he can't comprehend what he's reading- all he can feel is the air conditioning and Lian breathing on his neck. _Vietnam Child Welfare, 5 kilometers._

And then he gets it.

_This _was the reason that Jade sent him this way, to this particular location. All of the pieces fall together then, and everything makes a sick sort of sense.

_This _was why she wanted him to take Lian, for _him _to be the one that took care of her for three days, only to give her away. Jade must have known what he would have thought of doing, and she wanted _him _to do it because neither of them could keep Lian and she knew it. Roy was just there to do her dirty work.

A sort of white hot rage takes over him then and he's never hated another person as much as he hates Jade right in that moment.

Her plan all along was to get him to take his daughter- _their _daughter- to an orphanage because Jade couldn't bear to do it herself.

Jade is a lot of things, but Roy never took her for a coward.

.x.

The five kilometers, roughly about three miles, seems shorter than normal. He holds Lian close in his arms, tighter than he ever has before, and he doesn't know why. He tries to hold her looser, but he can't figure out how.

He's pathetic, really.

Time moves faster then, mocking him, and before he even realizes that he's taken a step he's there. He can't read the writing on the door, it's in Vietnamese, and the place is plain. Not scraggly or dirty, there isn't even a weed in sight, but just white and blank.

It's not a very warm place. His apartment, his shitty apartment with the crack in the wall that can't even fit his crappy couch and crappy TV in the same room, has more personality than this place and that's saying something.

He reaches out and knocks on the door, one hand arm still wrapped around Lian. He can feel her soft breathing on his neck. She has no idea what's about to happen, what he's about to do, how her life is about to change. All she knows is that she's fed and changed and comfortable wrapped in her dad's arms.

The thought hurts.

A woman comes up to the door, surprised at first and then her face hardens when she realizes what he's about to do. She asks him something in Vietnamese, and Roy has to fumble around a little bit before he manages to get a grasp on what she's saying. He listened to tapes for Jade, but there's only so much that he remembers.

After all, he never thought that he would need to use it.

_Is it yours? _

_Yes. _His pronunciation is atrocious.

She opens the door for him to come in, looking annoyed before her face smooths. He passes several kids as he walks with her, and they all stop talking when they see him walk in, a baby in his arms. They all look clean and well fed, varying in age.

Something in Roy's stomach clenches before releasing as he sees their faces.

The woman stops in front of a door, allowing him to go in first again. It's an office. He lets her sit down first before following in suit. Lian wiggles then and he knows that she's awake. He wonders if she's realized what's about to happen.

She's been talking for several minutes before Roy realizes that she's waiting for him to go on. He nods, smoothing his hand over Lian's head. Her hair is so soft, baby soft. He takes in every inch of her then, her dark eyes and hair, the way she blinks and makes quiet noises in the back of her throat.

The woman's voice is sharp then, and he doesn't understand what in the world she's saying, but her arms are reaching out for Lian, the universal sign for give me.

Roy hesitates for a second, squeezing Lian tighter, before he realizes that he has to let her go. He made the decision last night and he can't give her the kind of life that she deserves.

This is killing him and he doesn't know why. He shouldn't be this attached to Lian, except he is. She's beautiful and she was his.

And now she's just beautiful.

He releases his hold on his daughter and give her to the woman. Lian's eyes are wide open and he imagines a resigned look on her face.

The woman asks him something else, and he answers because this time he knows what she's saying. He nods, gets up, and walks out the door.

He can't forget Lian's face.

.x.

_She won't remember this. _

That's the first thing that Roy thinks when he's out the door, walking down the road. For the first time in three days there's no extra eight pounds in his arms, no bag to carry because he left it at the orphanage, nothing but him.

Lian won't remember how he found her, note by her head and the supplies that he would need for her all in a basket, like a gift. She won't remember how he carried her for practically three days straight, except when he had to rest.

Lian won't remember falling asleep on his chest, the way that she felt like the whisper of a person as she breathed against his neck and her hair tickled his cheek when the wind blew. She won't remember how the watched the sunrise together, how he had panicked because he never truly knew what in the hell he was doing.

That's what kills him, what undoes him.

Lian won't remember Roy, but he'll never be able to forget her.

It's at that second that he turns around, not being able to get any further away from Lian. He wants her in his arms again.

Roy doesn't have an hormonal imbalance after birth to blame by this selfishness. He's just selfish. He just wants Lian. And maybe he's not the perfect dad- he's not a perfect anything anyway.

All he knows is that he loves Lian, and he likes to think that she loves him too.

He'll be getting his daughter back, and he won't be taking no for an answer.

.x.

Roy Harper is a fucktard.

But he's also a father.

**A/N: **Aaaaand that's all folks! This is done, though probably not completely. There are _so many _things that I want to explore in this universe, and I will most likely do so (I've even written this whole little summary on all of the things that I think will happen next, haha). On tumblr, though, not on here. But any way, please review, I'd really appreciate it!

**Note: For all of those who care, the sequels will be up soon, on FFN, in a story called 'Look At Me Now' so if interested in a sequel-ish thing then check out my profile. **


End file.
